To EQ, or not to EQ. That is the question.

Duckman33

Hi folks! New Polk owner here and loving it! Not a huge audiophile, but I know what I like to hear.

Had a question for the gurus in the forums, or anyone that wants to give their 2 cents. As you can see from my sig, I'm running a Yamaha HTR-5063. After setting my room up with the automated calibration software (Yamaha YPAO), I'm wondering if I need to EQ further or leave it as set by the receiver? Reason I ask is, the receiver has a manual EQ setting for each set of speakers (minus the SUB) and I'm wondering if I need to bother with tweaking it further, or leave the individual EQ settings flat and set it to use the PEQ setting, which uses the EQ settings from the YPAO calibration. There is a choice to use either PEQ, GEQ (manual EQ) or Flat. I have tried the Flat setting, but the PEQ sounds a lot better to me.

It seems I'm not getting the bass response I'd like. (this could have something to do with the SUB I'm using too, not sure. Maybe I need to add another SUB?) I tend to favor a pretty heavy low end when I listen to music. Comes from my days playing music in the clubs I think. We always made sure the bass was heavy to help entice dancing from the crowd. Dancing crowd = more drinks sold = happy club owner ya know!

Anyway I know it really comes down to what sounds best to me, but I'm also concerned with not ruining my new speaks. I look forward to reading your thoughts/suggestions appreciated! TIA!

Joe08867

What sub are you using now?

How bass heavy are we talking here? Club style thump or boom?

I will guess and say you either need a better sub? Or possible two subs. You will never get the bass you want our of Monitor 60's.

Duckman33

Sorry, thought I had my SUB in my sig. It's a PSW10. I know it's not the greatest but got it new for $79 from New Egg.

To answer your question. I guess want to feel the bass a tad. I mostly listen to rock. Anything from 70's rock, 80's hair band/new wave, 90's grunge, to current stuff like Alter Bridge, Disturbed, Tool, etc. Some things I listen to the bass is there some it's not. Have the fronts set to small by the way. Crossover was set automatically to 100Hz.

Joe08867

I would switch the 60's to large and try that. They can handle what that receiver can put out. Especially in HT mode. Also how do you have them situated. How far from the listening position and how far from each other? This can all add to bass loss.

I would leave the Sub at 100hz. Also where do you have the sub? Is it stuck in a corner, in the middle of a wall or what?

Duckman33

Cool, thanks I'll try the large setting and see how it goes. Reason I set it to small was the HTR manual said any speakers smaller than 6 1/2" should be set to small.

Have to tell you the M60's are a HUGE improvement over my old Sony SS-F6000's LOL.

The M60's are about 7' to 8' from my couch. about 5' to 6' apart on either side of my LCD. Sub is facing towards the listening area on the left hand side in between the wall and my left M60. It's about 12" out from being stuck right in the corner due to me having to put a lamp there.

Been doing some reading on YPAO since posting this, and it seems to be common to have bass loss when using it. I wonder if I should just turn the SUB volume up a bit as well as setting the M60's to large...

tonyb

Go intp speaker levels in the menu, under sub, boost the level to around +3 or 4 and see if that helps.
On another note, did you really think you were going to get nightclub bass out of a $79 subwoofer ?

Duckman33

LOL no I wasn't expecting huge multi-12" Klipsch nightclub/band PA sub cabinet-like performance. I did think that upgrading my fronts to the M60's would help a lil bit.

I also thought a $229 retail (purchased for $79) 10" sub would be a big improvement over my 10+ year old Kenwood 8" sub that came with a theater in a box system. Is that an unrealistic expectation or am I missing something here?

cnh

Yeah...you need a bigger, badder sub than a PSW10.

Try, at the very least, a PSW 505--available at newegg.com for 229 or less. Or if you have some more cash...an Epik, or SVS (see their sites).

cnh

Duckman33

Actually I have been eyeballing that very sub. It was mentioned in another thread I was reading here. I'll have to wait for a few months down the road though. All in all, I'm really loving these Polks!

Duckman33

Changing the M60's to large helped a lot. I also changed the EQ to GEQ and bumped up the low end of the EQ and now I'm getting the desired results. Thanks for the suggestions!

Joe08867

Glad we could help.